My emotional deposit for the group.

[noelani72]

So, some folks here know I can be an odd duck.
I mean, I dress up in professional costumes for cripes sakes

I had an ugly childhood -well, that is not entirely fair to say...I had it rough in Catholic school and I'll leave it at that.

Over the years, I have wrote about my life and kept it tucked away.
I planned on doing a book of some sort..to see if I was messed up inside and loathing in self pity about certain things.

One area of my 'book' would center around my old toys.
I am approaching 40 this year...

I don't have the Mego Holy Grails by any stretch of the imagination...I don't mind if I have DrMego gloves on my childhood Batman...he is still mine...I don't care if I authored a repro backer card and have him hanging on the wall..he is still mine.

I recently boasted in a thread about getting a really awesome, reproduction Destro GI Joe backer card. Sure, I had tons of Gi Joe figs from the early 1980's and I clearly remember selling em all off in a darn rummage sale. I liked this Destro card sooo much, that I just bought a vintage Destro off eVilbay to card him up and I plan to get a few other select figs to do the same.

A random google search while trying to decipher a dream I recently had...led me to this - truly wonderfully written article that I must share:

http://bulldawg1124.hubpages.com/hub...e-collect-toys

I couldn't have written it better myself.
Explains me since about 1995 when Star Wars figs were making a comeback and my kids were coming of age....

[Bill]

PMed, fine sir.

[Captain Big Trousers]

I had an unfortunate childhood too, and collecting memorabilia from a time when I was oblivious to that fact probably does have some (deep? shallow?) psychological roots, but you know what started this...?



I bought a phone. One bloody phone triggered this whole room. Once upon a time I was a relatively normal, young urban professional with a normal and tastefully decorated apartment. But then... the phone.

Not just any phone, mind you. The wife and I were out shopping when we randomly strolled into a phone shop and saw... it.



The Nickelodeon Talkblaster!!!

This thing had wacky ringtones (cows mooing, mad laughter, a doo-wop group...) and flashing lights. It was crazy, and in one crazy impulsive moment, I bought it.

So we took it home and put it on my sensibly and tastefully decorated young urban professional desk.

Where it stood out like mammary glands on a bull.

What to do? How to disguise this mad phone? The solution, I decided, was a small (and tasteful) collection of other green and purple things. The movie Toy Story was out at the time - I was into 3D modelling - so having a Buzz Lightyear on my desk wasn't unreasonable, was it?



And it worked! So maybe an 8" Marvin the Martian? Not unreasonable.

Then I stumbled upon a Trendmasters Lost in Space robot in Target for $29. And a vinyl R2D2 pen jar for $6. I seemed to have an accidental space/robot collection going, so my wife bought me a 12" Dalek one Christmas. Fast forward 17 years and, well... look above.

All entirely accidental.



Oh and the original phone? Fell off the desk while cleaning and broke. Buzz went on to perform outstandingly as a toy for my (eventual) son.

[VintageMike]

I actually had a pretty fun childhood. What followed maybe not so much! So my toys bring me back to those magical childhood days. Pictures are great but to have something physically, particularly in the same state it was then is like a frozen piece of time to me.

[HumanWolfman]

That was excellent.

[Blue Meanie]

Where or what is the animal from in the picture:



That is a really cool piece.

Mego's are what brings me back to my childhood. It started with a pickup at a toy show I was doing as a seller. Guy with the table across the way from me had a Mego Carrying case. I just wanted the carrying case cause it reminded me what I had when I was a kid. I would tote that thing to my Aunt and Uncle's apartments in Brooklyn every other weekend along with one box of comics that me and my bro would split equally so we had something to read in the car on the way in and if we got bored we would go in a spare room of the apartment and read there. Anyway, I pick up the case and feel that there is something in it. I open it and there sat a complete all original, Doc was making repro's at the time, Bats, Robin, Joke and Penguin. I had to have it. Asked the seller how much and he says he'd give me it all for $100. I was having a great show selling lots of Joes and Star Wars 90's figures....That's how it really started for me. Been a downward spiral ever since

Brings me to my next point: I tell people all the time that ask me for tips on collecting...Collect because you enjoy it and it brings you some sort of happiness. If you're in it for the money, then it's for the wrong reason. Go invest in stocks or something...but don't collect toys because you think it will be worth something someday. It will bring you nothing but disappointment.

[Captain Big Trousers]

Where or what is the animal from in the picture:

He is/was by (now defunct) Master Replicas.



I made the drums from a $30 Toys'R'Us set.

[megocrazy]

Collect because you enjoy it and it brings you some sort of happiness. If you're in it for the money, then it's for the wrong reason. Don't collect toys because you think it will be worth something someday. It will bring you nothing but disappointment.

Well said Berto. I've done some form of toy collecting my whole life. The actual collecting slowed down a lot when I was racing R/C but resumed once my boys were born and I "settled" down.

Don't do it for the money. Complete waste of time. Go find some Beanie Baby collectors and ask them. I still see people collecting Beanie Babies today. They are true collectors. Do it for the enjoyment not the dollars. I love Mego figures but truthfully only had 5 as a kid. Spidey, Captain America, and 3 AJ's. I had a ton of Star Wars figures, and other toys, but no where near as many memories as I had with my Mego figures.

As for being messed up for being a collector. I've watched drunken people race cars with action figures down a sidewalk beside a main street at 10 o'clock at night. You bet ya sweet *** were messed up. I've seen the normal people. They're way over rated. I consider "messed in the head toy collector" a compliment.

[Den82]

I don't know if I should talk so publicly about my childhood, but both my parents were extremely young when they had my older sister and then married. I think my dad was 24 when they had me. So really, I don't think he knew much as to how to raise a son and that coupled with the fact he grew up mostly poor, thought that buying things was all it took or a simple solution.

So I did have a massive toy collection. I've always had an interest in them, but only in the last 2 years or so has it become an obsession and I started to buy them again.

There are all kinds of collectors. Some who had everything as a kid and now want it all back. There are also those who grew up poor and now as adults, want to snatch up all the things they wanted.

My dad knew a guy who grew up super poor and as a result, he became a hoarder or toys as an adult. My dad told me he would buy every toy he saw and you could barely walk in his house and his hunger for toys made him extremely greedy and cutthroat. To the point he was always ripping people off and stealing from sales.

[4NDR01D]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWWPyKRoB5Y

Here's a video pan of his collection of toys/oddities (two parts). I imagine you'll have to mute it as the weird ambeint music goes for a long time and is hard to listen too. I highly recommend this doc, it's crazy good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SAh4...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ak1ln...eature=related

[Saroyan]

It's funny, I started collecting Hot Wheels 5 years ago after accidentally buying a Treasure Hunt for my son. My child hood was not perfect, but still pretty good- I have many more good memories than bad ones. I had maybe 6 Hot Wheels growing up- still have one original left. I now have 2-3 thousand. I remember some fun playing with them as a kid but I think it's my adult love of cars that fuels that collection.

Megos are different. I only ever had one at a time. Spiderman, Batman, maybe a Superman- but I remember looking at the pictures of ALL the WGSH together and dreaming of how amazing it must be to have that many to play with at once- an epic battle of good vs evil...that never happened for me with only one figure to battle against.....himself??

I know one day, I will have a complete collection of Megos- will I have my epic battle then? Who knows, but I know I can if I want to!!

Thanks for the link to that article- it really hit home!

[4NDR01D]

The Nickelodeon Talkblaster!!!

This thing had wacky ringtones (cows mooing, mad laughter, a doo-wop group...) and flashing lights. It was crazy, and in one crazy impulsive moment, I bought it.


Oh and the original phone? Fell off the desk while cleaning and broke. Buzz went on to perform outstandingly as a toy for my (eventual) son.

I really like this room. also, I think you should get another nickelodeon talkblaster.

NICKELODEON TELEPHONE TALK BLASTER CORDED N2500 | eBay

[Adam West]

Great article. I have always collecting items (since I was young) and I think there is something (I don't know if it is a gene) that gives some people a collector mentality while others don't have it. I can't even say it's nostalgia per se. There is defininitely a good feeling there, that might feel like nostagia but I really can't say that my Washington Redskins collections is nostalgic per se since many of the item I own were prior to me being born. I also collect Anri type items and only started because they were a neat looking nice carved decorative piece but it wasn't a brand that I even knew existed when I was a kid. I think it has to do with how we are wired. I definitely think there is a correlation with creativity along with talents in various arts and collecting. Receiving an item that you collect definitely illicits an emotion. My wife who doesn't collect anything is wired differently. I am not kidding when I say if we visited the Louvre, she would have had her fill within 30 minutes while I would probably be there from open to close and still feel like I need to go back. She would look at the "Mona Lisa" for 30 seconds tops while I would stare at it for at least 10 minutes taking in everything. I don't know if anyone has completed an official study on it, but just my own take on why people collect.

[Captain Big Trousers]

I really like this room. also, I think you should get another nickelodeon talkblaster.

NICKELODEON TELEPHONE TALK BLASTER CORDED N2500 | eBay

Haha, no. This way madness lies.

My current desk phone is a mint 1974 Telstra "802"...



... which I quite like.

[noelani72]

PMed, fine sir.

back at ya bro.

glad everyone liked the article.
It really hit home for me.

Ohh, btw, I got my vintage Destro in the mail yesterday. Gonna card him up this weekend. It was like being a kid all over again.

My wish list to re-card thanks to that beggars canyon toys:
Baroness
Cobra Commander
Crimson Guard
Eels
Storm Shadow
Zartan